Out of Control
by Forlay
Summary: In the course of one afternoon, Rachel has two very different


_Author's Notes: My muse has taken a very evil bent lately. I think it's 'cause I caught her reading some trashy romances ~shudders~ Anyway, here's the rather bizarre plot bunny she came up with. Be warned: this isn't a pretty fic, bad things happen._   
_This story is taken totally out of the cannonical timeline. It's several years in the future, takes place after 45 but ignores all of the other books that have come out._   
_And let's say the Animorphs are 18 at the time of this fic, 'kay? 'Kay._   
_And I have a terrible habit of rambling through my author's notes, but I swear this is the last one...for now. Anyways, this is dedicated to all my friends on...well, various mailing lists celebrating unconventional Animorphs couples. I forget which list spawned the initial conversation on this basic plot, but all of them offered helpful insights on how to make this better than the original version._   


#  Out of Control

##  By: Forlay

Rachel rang the doorbell for the second time. _Where is everybody?_ She knew at least Tom was home, his car was in the driveway. Jake should have been home, too. Marco was having family time with his parents, and Jake only went out with _his_ parents on full family outings. So why wasn't anyone answering the door?   
She was just about to press the button again when the door opened slightly.   
"About time," she muttered. Louder, she said, "Hi...oh, hi, Tom. Uh, is Jake there?"   
You have an awful pretty cousin. >   
Shut up! You're sick. >   
The Yeerk laughed. I know. And it'll be so fun making your family think _you're_ the sick one. >   
Rachel shifted uncomfortably under Tom's stare. "Tom?"   
Tom shook his head as if to clear it. "Sorry, Rachel. I don't know if he's here or not. come in a sec, I'll see if I can find him."   
"Thanks," Rachel said. She stepped inside, Tom closed the door soundly behind her.   
Now, where should we do this? Can we get her up to your room? No, that's too boring, too predictable. We'd never get her up there. The kitchen? Easiest, perhaps, but who wants this to be easy? >   
You perverted bastard. >   
Tom, when will you learn that insults will get you nowhere with me? What do you think of the living room? >   
"Sit on the couch or something," Tom instructed Rachel. "I'll see if Jake's upstairs." Rachel did as Tom suggested as he ran up the stairs, wondering why Tom was acting so strange. First he was distant and preoccupied, making Rachel think she'd caught the Yeerk at the end of its feeding cycle, or just before it had to go meet Visser One, but now he was acting like she was an old friend coming over for tea!   
_Men! Whether they're under alien control or not, I'll never understand them._   
Tom came back down the stairs. "Nope, he's not here."   
"Any idea where he's gone?"   
"How should I know? I can't keep track of Jake's social life. I have my own to take care of."   
"Well, tell him I dropped by, okay?" Rachel stood up to go.   
"Wait, hang around awhile."   
No! >   
Rachel glanced at Tom. "Why?"   
Tom shrugged. "I never get to see you. I mean, you're my cousin, we live just a few blocks away from eachother, and yet we hardly ever see eachother unless you're coming over here with Cassie to see Jake."   
Rachel shrugged. "You have your social life, I have mine."   
"Well, why is that?"   
"What do you mean?"   
"Why are our social lives separate?"   
"Uh...because our social spheres are totally different, and our families have never been all that close, and I have to be going now. Bye, Tom."   
"Wait!" Tom reached out and grabbed Rachel's arm.   
"Let go of me, Tom."   
"Stay. Talk awhile."   
"I can't. I have to go out and meet Cassie."   
"Then why did you stop here?"   
Rachel thought quickly, trying to come up with a good lie. "I needed to deliver a message from Cassie."   
"The phone wouldn't have worked?"   
Rachel sighed. "I really have to go, Tom."   
But Tom didn't let go. He tightened his grip on Rachel's wrist. "You can't go. Not yet."   
Rachel was strong, but she was no match for a 20 year old guy in good health. There was no escaping his grip on her strength alone, but she couldn't morph. Not just yet, anyway, for if she did, she'd have to kill Tom. Not something she wanted to try and explain to the family.   
"You gotta stay, Rachel. Mom and Dad are out all day, my brother's out who knows where for who knows how long...it's lonely here by myself."   
"You allegedly have a social life, go out with some of your Sharing friends."   
"But it'd be nice to have some new friends."   
"Okay, Tom? You're kinda scaring me now. Please, let my arm go."   
"C'mon, Rachel. I need you."   
"You need therapy. You're crazy."   
Tom jerked Rachel to him, so she was sitting on his knee. "_Never_ call me crazy," he hissed in her ear.   
"Okay, okay, I'm sorry," Rachel apologized quickly. "You're right, that was rude on my part, but will you please let me go? You're hurting me, Tom."   
"I'm sorry, Rachel," Tom said, running his free hand through her hair. "I don't want to hurt you, but you need to be nicer to me."   
"What do you mean?"   
Tom didn't answer. In one swift movement, he had Rachel lying on the couch, one arm pinned under her while Tom held the other.   
I've waited a long time for this. >   
God, Rachel! No! >   
"Tom! Tom, dammit, let go of me! Get off!"   
For a brief moment, Tom's face flickered and Rachel saw the real Tom. He looked scared. "I'm sorry, Rachel," he whispered, but the Yeerk quickly regained control. "You're not getting out of this!" Rachel wasn't sure if the Yeerk was talking to her or Tom.   
Tom - or his Yeerk - began fumbling with the buttons on Rachel's jeans, even as she kicked and lashed out at him.   
"It'll be okay, Rachel," Tom told her.   
"Bull shit!" she shouted. She closed her eyes and began to concentrate on the image of the bear, but it wasn't coming to her. She was too distracted by trying to keep Tom at bay and more than slightly panicked.   
Tom got her jeans off and began working on his own. Rachel closed her eyes again to concentrate. This was serious, it had to be stopped.   
"Hey, hey!" Tom smacked her face. "No passing out on me."   
"If only I could be so lucky!" she spat.   
With one hand being used to undo his own jeans, Tom was only holding Rachel down with one arm, giving her was would probably be her only chance at escaping. She hadn't gone to gymnastics in years, but she still remembered some of her training. She tensed her legs and when Tom wasn't looking, she swung them up, hoping to give herself enough momentum to flip herself over.   
But Tom must have been paying more attention to her than she thought because before her legs were halfway up, Tom's arm swung up, knocking her legs back down.   
"You shouldn't do that, Rachel, you really shouldn't," Tom admonished. "This should be fun and easy, not a trial." He stepped out of his jeans and boxers, then struggled to pull off Rachel's brief underwear.   
"Easy? Fun? Good Lord, Tom! You really are crazy!"   
"I told you not to call me that!" he violently pulled off her underwear then straddled her on the couch.   
In the process of moving onto the couch, Tom had loosened his grip on her just enough so she could pull her now cramped arm out from under her. She could hardly move it since the circulation had been cut off, but she could scratch at Tom's face now, perhaps distract him enough to fight him off.   
She hasn't screamed yet, they usually scream. >   
You've done this before?! >   
I need to do _something_ with my host's spare time. >   
Tom grabbed Rachel's free arm just before her nails connected with his eyes. "I don't think so." He pinned her arms above her head. He put his legs on hers, weighting them down so she could hardly move. She was helpless, and Tom knew it. He had won.

It didn't last long. Not as long as it had with Tobias, definitely not as long or as pleasurable as with Cassie, for which Rachel was grateful. When he finished, Tom simply rolled off her, got dressed and left the room. A few moments later Rachel heard his car engine start and the car pull out of the driveway. When he was gone, that's when Rachel let the tears start. Silently at first she she carefully found the clothes Tom had strewn across the room, but she became louder as she struggled to pull her clothes back on, crying out louder in pain, both physical and emotional, with every movement.   
She staggered to the nearest phone and dialed Cassie's number, praying she'd be home.   
"Hello?"   
"Cassie?"   
"What's wrong?"   
Rachel smiled. Leave it to Cassie to figure out something was wrong in a word. "I need you to come get me. I'm at Jake's."   
"Jake's? What the hell?"   
"Just come over here. Please?"   
"Of course. Hold on, Rachel. I'm coming."   
Rachel hung up the phone and sank down to the floor, her head on her knees. A million questions were running through her head, most variations on _Why?!_ Why the hell would Tom - or his Yeerk, really - want to rape her? Rape was sick and wrong in the first place, but when the victim was your _cousin_, about 50 ethical and moral rules were broken right there.   
Cassie didn't bother ringing the bell or knocking at the front door. If Rachel needed help, there obviously wasn't anybody else home. "Rachel!" she shouted when she got in the front door.   
"I'm in here," she heard Rachel call back.   
Cassie went to the front hall that connected the living room to the kitchen. Cassie knew there was a phone down the hall, that'd be the place Rachel would be.   
She was right. Rachel was sitting next to the small table that had the phone on it, her head in her arms. Cassie knelt next to her and put an arm around Rachel's shoulders. "What happened?"   
"That-that bastard, Tom. He...the bastard _raped_ me. Me! His own fucking cousin!"   
"Tom did?"   
"Yes, Tom! Or his Yeerk, anyway." Rachel sobbed and put her head on Cassie's arm. "Get me out of here. Please."   
"Of course." Carefully, Cassie helped Rachel stand and get out to her car.   
Cassie began to drive aimlessly, allowing Rachel to simply stare morosely out the window. But they had to talk eventually. "Do you want to go home?" Cassie asked at an intersection.   
"God, no. I must look like shit, I don't want to try and explain this to her."   
Cassie considered commenting on the fact Rachel never looked like shit to her, but thought it better not to at the moment. "So what do you want to do? Are you going to tell anybody?"   
"How am I supposed to tell anyone that my cousin raped me? Mom doesn't have many good feelings for that side of the family as it is, if I told her she'd probably bring up a huge lawsuit against them, which is the last thing we need about now. Dad wouldn't believe that his precious nephew would do something like this...guess I'm stuck with staying silent."   
"What about Jake?"   
"What about him?"   
"Don't you think maybe he should know he's living with a rapist? Maybe he could do something about it."   
"Like what?"   
Cassie shrugged and made a right turn when the light was green. "I'm just tossing out ideas here. I don't know what to do either. I never once even considered that...well, something like this could happen. To either of us. You know? We've got dozens of deadly morphs at our disposal, and yet you couldn't beat off Tom."   
Rachel sighed and leaned her head against the window. "I tried. God knows I tried. But I couldn't beat off someone his size, and I knew if I morphed I'd have to kill him, so I waited until it was absolutely necesary...and when it was necessary, I panicked." She sniffed as she felt the tears threatening to start again.   
"We'll go to my house," Cassie said firmly. "No one else is home, so you won't have to try and explain anything, and we can get you cleaned up."   
Through her pain, Rachel smiled. "In other words, you're confirming I look like shit."   
"I am not!" Cassie said indignantly. "I'm only saying that I'm sure you don't want to go out anywhere with tangled hair and a bruise forming on your cheek."   
Rachel pulled down the visor and checked her face in the mirror. "I didn't think he hit me that hard," she commented softly.   
Cassie put a hand on Rachel's knee, causing Rachel to jerk away instinctively. Cassie lifted her hand. "I'm sorry."   
Rachel shook her head. "No, I'm just overreacting. I'm the one who's sorry."   
Cassie sighed. "It'll be alright, Rachel. Just you wait."

Rachel walked into Cassie's room, rubbing her hair with a towel. When Cassie had offered her the chance to shower, Rachel had gladly accepted. Anything to get rid of the feeling that Tom was still with her. She'd ended up spending half an hour in the shower, letting the hot water pound on her back until it ran out.   
"I know it's a little cold, but all my jeans are too short for you so you'll have to deal with shorts," Cassie apologized as she handed a pair of denim shorts to Rachel.   
"That's because the last time you went jeans shopping was in ninth grade," Rachel joked easily, anything to avoid talking about the day's events. She picked up Cassie's brush and began running it through her hair with one hand while the other kept the towel closed tightly around her.   
"It was not! It was more like tenth."   
Rachel rolled her eyes. "Our next date is to the mall."   
"No, it's not. It's my turn to choose."   
"No, you chose last time. We went to the movies, remember?"   
Cassie smiled impishly. "Yeah, we did. But I feel like taking another turn."   
"You're just trying to get out of going to the mall. I won't let it happen. We're going to the mall."   
"Eventually. Maybe." Cassie gently took the brush from Rachel's hand and put it down on the desk. "But there's something I want to do first."   
Rachel froze at Cassie's touch. _Dammit, Rachel! Get a hold of yourself! She's not going to hurt you._ But despite what her rational mind told her, Rachel's body wouldn't cooperate.   
Cassie shook her head sadly when she noticed Rachel's panicked look. _How could that bastard break the spirit of this beautiful, self confident woman?_   
"Rachel," Cassie said softly, resisting the urge to push a strand of damp hair out of Rachel's face. "You need to tell someone. You can't duck away from physical contact the rest of your life."   
Rachel sat down on Cassie's bed with a sigh. "Telling someone would be pretty pointless at this point, I've washed away all proof, for which I'm thankful," she shuddered. "I couldn't stand the feeling Tom left me with for much longer."   
Cassie sat down next to Rachel. "I don't care about whether there's proof or not, or even who you tell. But it's gotta be someone besides me, someone who...oh, hell, I don't know, Rachel! I don't know what to do anymore than you do, I just know that I don't want you to suffer anymore than you've had to."   
Rachel felt her tears threatening to come back in full force. She'd have been able to handle this situation if it was only hurting her...but not being able to stand Cassie's touch was hurting Cassie, too. "Who would you suggest, Cassie?" she asked quietly.   
Cassie shrugged helplessly. "If you're so sure your parents won't do anything, I really think Jake is your best bet. He may not believe you right away, but he won't discount your story immediately, either."   
Rachel held back a sharp laugh. "Cassie, I'm not exactly one of Jake's favorite people. Haven't been for years."   
"But you're still his cousin, and he knows you're not a liar. He also knows that it's not actually his brother you're blaming, but the Yeerk in Tom's head. Jake knows the Yeerks are capable of despicable acts."   
"I don't know, incest and rape are minor offenses compared to some of the other shit they've done. Jake probably doesn't think they'd do something so...petty."   
"Rachel, this isn't petty! This is serious!"   
"I know, I know! I just don't want to have to deal with it. I don't want to try and tell the others."   
"Do you want me to tell someone then?"   
Rachel considered Cassie's offer for a moment. Did she _really_ want anyone else to know about her rape? On the other hand, Jake, at least, should probably know about the sickening deeds his brother's Yeerk was capable of. "I guess you're right, Jake should know. And you'll tell him?"   
Cassie nodded emphatically. "Whenever you want me to."   
"After I've gone home," Rachel said. She stood up and reached for the clothes Cassie had laid out on the desk. As she was about to pull the shirt over her head, she glanced out the window. "Shit. You drove me here, didn't you?"   
"I'm afraid so."   
Rachel sighed. "Guess I'll have to fly out of here." She gave the shirt back to Cassie. "I'll...uh, I guess I'll come back for the rest of my clothes later." Here was the awkward part. Whenever she was leaving, it was habit to give Cassie a kiss...but touching anyone at the moment was more than Rachel could handle. So she just nodded again, closed her eyes and concentrated on her eagle morph.   
Cassie sighed as she opened the window for Rachel to fly out. Life had a habit of dealing one shitty hand to them after another. Meeting Elfangor, losing their childhood innocence in a war they should never have had to fight, and hundreds of other incidents, culminating in this one. How had life gotten so out of control?   


_Additional Author's Notes: Before people start clamoring for a sequel (because I know you people, I know you will!) I'm going to tell you right now that there will be at least one more, with Cassie telling Jake and an... interesting conversation Jake has with Rachel afterwards. I'll just leave you thinking on that note for awhile ~evil grin~._


End file.
